


If Everything Else Were To Fall Away

by WhisperOfWarmth



Category: Reylo - Fandom, Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Star Wars Setting, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Force Bond (Star Wars), Kylo Ren Redemption, Kylo Ren is Matt the Radar Technician, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Rey Needs A Hug, Reylo - Freeform, Romantic Fluff, Supreme Leader Kylo Ren, The Last Jedi - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-01
Updated: 2018-05-01
Packaged: 2019-04-30 11:33:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14496072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhisperOfWarmth/pseuds/WhisperOfWarmth
Summary: A connection.A bond.A friendship.Kylo Ren And Rey form a strong physical and emotional attachment to each other during the tumultuous time they spend together. But when things between them go wrong, Kylo goes to desperate lengths to woo the woman of his dreams into his arms.He only hopes it’s not too late.





	1. Chapter 1

Rey sighed as she looked out of the small window in her room. A speeder-bike delivery man was pulling up to the front entrance, and Rey watched as one of the members of maintenance signed for a rather large stuffed animal. She hoped against hope that the enormous toy was for somebody, ANYBODY else; but ten minutes later, when the knock came on her door, she quickly cast aside that foolish notion.

She had been receiving gifts like this for the past few weeks, and, while nobody else in the Resistance knew who the presents came from, Rey knew exactly, and it made her cringe inside.

After the battle on Crait, and the Resistance’s subsequent escape to a new secret base, life had taken on a slow cadence. The First Order was adjusting to their radical change in leadership, and the Resistance was working to rebuilt their vanquished ships, supplies, and to recruit more people to their cause.

In the middle of all this newness and reinvention, one day, Rey received a Force call from the Supreme Leader, Kylo Ren.

The two hadn’t ended on the best of terms, and Rey wasn’t pleased to see him. She very nearly severed their connection again, until Kylo successfully pleaded with him to talk to her.

And talk, they did.

For several hours, over many days.

While they both realized that it was impossible for one or the other to give up the lives they had chosen to lead, they also admitted that they shared a great deal in common, and had issues that needed to be resolved, for either of them to have any sort of peace of mind.

And then, it happened.

Several weeks ago, Rey and Kylo Ren had slept with each other.

Both of them had acknowledged that they had a strong physical attraction to each other, and agreed to meet somewhere, neutral territory, to fulfill their needs. It had to be a secret, of course; for either of them to freely admit that they had fraternized in such a manner, with the ‘enemy’, would be looked at as a treasonous act by both parties.

And Rey honestly couldn’t figure out where she had gone wrong, here.

She had been totally honest and completely up-front with Kylo, before they were even in the same star-system as each other, about what she wanted from their ‘encounter’.

And she had enjoyed it. They overthrew logical thought and acted purely on base instinct. It was sensual, it was carnal. And there was something about the danger of the act, the ‘wrongness’ of it, that made the whole thing toxically exciting. She thought it was fun, and she assumed Kylo had enjoyed it too (although he DID cry a bit more than she’d expected). Both were too exhausted to move afterwards, so they spent the night together. In the morning, they parted with kind words, and with a hug, and Rey had thought, Okay, it’s out of our systems now, and that’s that.

But that WASN’T the end.

About two days after their rendezvous, the Resistance base received the largest shipment of flowers that any one of them had ever seen before. An entire ship crammed to bursting with bouquet upon bouquet of Rey’s favorite bloom: dala-roses. All addressed to the pint-sized Force user.

There was a single card that the pilot of the transport delivered to her. It contained no name, no clue of the identity of the sender, but rather, a poem:

Beauty in the darkest hours  
Calls out with your light, reaching,  
Your magnificent outshines every one of these flowers  
I hope that soon, we will be speaking

Rey had fielded questions as best she could, blushing furiously as members of the Resistance unloaded the ship and found locations for all the blooms. Rey’s own room was filled to gag-inducing capacity, and she had to really struggle to find a calm center so she could force connect to Kylo.

She dropped in on him in the middle of writing something at his desk. When he looked up and noticed she was there, he quickly turned the paper face-down, smiling at her.

“Hello, beautiful!”

“Ben. I ... I got your gift. And the poem.”

“Oh, good! Did you like them?”

Rey nodded. “The flowers are lovely,” she said, gesturing to all of them behind her, “But the poem has me concerned, to be honest.”

“Concerned, how?”

“Well, that seemed rather like a love poem, Ben. I thought I was very clear, when I said ...”

“No, no, you were! It wasn’t a love poem, it was a ... a friendship poem.”

“A friendship poem?”, she repeated skeptically.

“Yes. We can at least say we’re friends, now, can’t we?”

Rey sighed and nodded. “Yes, of course. But you understand that this is ALL we are, correct?”

“I said that I did! Oi!”

“So what are you writing?”

He looked down at his overturned paper, and blushed. “It’s, um, a ... a speech I’m giving.”

“Really? I thought Hux wrote your speeches for you.”

“Uh, I’m ... I’m writing this one.”

“Can I hear some of it?”

He shook his head vigorously.

“No, no, it wouldn’t interest you. Very boring, very ...”

“Ben.”

“What?!”

“Tell me the truth: that’s another poem for me, isn’t it?”

Kylo fiercely denied this, his face going an even deeper red, until she forced the confession out of him.

“Oh, for kriff’s sake, Ben! You JUST told me that you understood ...”

“It’s not what you think! It’s just another friendship poem!”

“You know what? I’ve got to go now, Ben. I’ll talk to you later, okay?”

“Okay,” he said, hunching his shoulders in disappointment. “Have a good day.”

“You, too.”

The next few days brought more gifts, each more lavish than the next. Candies, more flowers, expensive dresses. And the poems kept coming as well, each one sounding more like love than the one before it.

One morning, Rey slept in, and woke up to late-morning sunshine streaming in her window. She opened her eyes, turned her head, and shrieked out loud.

The image of Kylo was in the room with her, perched a few inches from her bedside ... and watching her sleep.

“What the hell, Ben?!”

“Sorry; I just wanted to say Good Morning, But you were sleeping, and I didn’t want to wake you.”

Rey sat up fully, yawning and stretching.

“Your, um, your ...”, he trailed off, pointing to his own chest.

Rey looked down and blushed. One of her breasts had slid out of her thin top. She quickly adjusted herself, scowling.

“What sort of a deviant watches a woman sleep while she’s partially unclothed?”

“It wasn’t like that when you were asleep! That happened just now, I swear!”

“Alright, then: what sort of a deviant watches a woman sleep, period?”

Instead of answering the question, he just laughed a little.

“I don’t remember you being this grumpy the last time we woke up together.”

“Ben, we ... we’re not together. In any capacity. At all.”

“That’s not true,” he contradicted her, that smirk still on his face, “We’re friends. You said so yourself.”

“Alright, Ben, answer me this: would a friend go out of his way to shower another friend with gifts, and poems, and repeatedly show up when the other friend isn’t prepared to receive such visits?”

Ben sighed, and began pulling at a lock of his hair with his thumb and index finger. This was something he did when nervous.

“Can I be honest with you, and tell you something?”

“ ... yes?”

“And you promise you won’t be angry?”

“I’ll try. What is it?”

“Okay. Okay, well, the thing is, I like you a lot, Rey. As ... as much more than a friend. I know this sounds crazy, but I truly believe that, if we tried, we could make something work between us. I’d, well, I’d like to be your ... boyfriend.”

Rey was knocked temporarily speechless by this (expected, yet dreaded) confession. 

“Are. You. CRAZY?”, she finally got out, through clenched teeth.

“Crazy for you, yes. Please, Rey, just tell me you’ll consider it. I would be the best ever to you, I know I would.”

“I told you that this wasn’t going to happen! We had a nice night together, one time. Once. That was the end of it. You have to accept that.”

Kylo pouted.

“It’s a very hard thing to just accept, when the woman you love ...”

“Wait, wait; did you say ‘love’?”

“Well, yes. I thought you realized, that I ...”

“Please, Ben, don’t do this.”

“I love you, Rey. I’m IN love with you. You’re the sun in my universe; everything in me, revolves around you. We belong together, sweetheart. It’s destiny.”

After several unblinking, staring moments, Rey focused, and she severed their force connection. Hard. She felt terribly sick all day afterwards and had to remain in bed for hours.

Why had she been so stupid?

The biggest problem in this situation, was that she knew, in her heart, that she loved Ben, too. But she had made the conscious, the painful, choice, to keep what they had at a platonic level. He had hurt her once before, and Rey had difficulty trusting those who had hurt her. She had spent almost her entire life lonely and abandoned by the two people she loved most, her parents, and she didn’t think she could go through that agony a second time. And no matter what Ben said or did, she knew that their fate together couldn’t possibly be anything but problematic. He could only remain Ben for so long, before he reverted back to Kylo Ren, destroyer of hope. She couldn’t commit herself to that likely future, no matter how badly she might want to. The fact that he kept pursuing her filled her with a sickening balance of hope and fear, the fact that he had confessed a real love for her, terrified her against all reason.

How could she have believed Ben telling her that he could accept a friends-only relationship? Moderation was not exactly in his skill set; this was the same man who once destroyed an entire planet because one person mocked his helmet while he was visiting.

And how could she have been so foolish, as to let him know the location of their base? Whether they were ‘friends’ or not, the First Order was STILL their enemies. With Rey rejecting him, Ben was likely to go full-on Kylo Ren, and send a fleet to wipe them all out, Rey included.

Yet fate had always seemed to look out for Rey, and the following day, fate took on the form of one of their allies informing them of a much larger facility in the mid-rim system, equipped with a better weapons arsenal and more upgraded technology. It was being given to Leia Organa as a gift, by a wealthy backer of the Resistance who had once been good friends with her adoptive father, Bail Organa.

Rey felt that she could breathe again, as they made the move. There was no way that Ben would know of this new location.

Or so she thought.

One day about a week later, she was strolling along the halls of the larger building, on her way to meet Finn for lunch. They had recently hired a handful of new staff members on the maintenance team, to help the old staff combat the larger facilities. Rey was passing by one of them now, and decided to stop and say hello.

A tall man stood up from the outlet he was working on, when she greeted him.

Very tall.

Disheveled blonde hair, glasses, and a pair of extremely warm brown eyes.

Rey took a step back, her heart thudding in her chest. Was she going crazy? Was she losing her mind? Or was this man ...

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, mi’lady,” the man said in a perfectly familiar deep voice, accompanied by an even more familiar smirk. “What might your name be?”

“Ben?”, she whispered weakly.

“Ben? That’s an interesting name for a girl. My name is Matt. I’m a radar technician.”

“You ... how did you even find ... do you realize how ridiculous this is?!”

Kylo shook his head. “You really left me no other choice, woman. You wouldn’t answer my letters, my holos, and you cut me off whenever I try to force-connect. What else could I - -“

“You could try leaving me the kark alone! For the love of the Maker, are there no women whatsoever in The First Order?”

“Of course there are. What does that have to do with anything?”

“Perhaps you should be going after those closer to you, Matt.”

Now he looked straight at her. “Why would I do that? I’m in love with YOU, not some other woman.”

“You’re not in love with me!”, she shouted at him, then, remembering their surroundings, lowered her voice and said “I promise you, you’re not. This isn’t love.”

“No? Well if it’s not, I’d hate to experience ‘real’ love; I can’t imagine going through anything more painful than this. Or more beautiful.”

One of the wires he had in his hand gave off a little spark and shocked him. He dropped it, cursing, to the ground.

Rey eyed him critically. “Do you even know what you’re doing??”

“Yes. Right now my plan is to relentlessly badger you for days, to wear you down, and then —“

“No, you idiot. I meant, with that gear you’re failing to fix.”

“Oh. Well, unfortunately, that’s not quite as simple. I was never that good at mechanical stuff. But give me enough time, I’ll learn.”

Rey shook her head. “So, you’re going to blow your cover and get yourself killed, or you’ll showcase your incompetence by wiring something incorrectly and blowing us all sky-high. Either way, this is NOT how I envisioned my week going.”

He looked up at her and smirked. “It’s funny how you claim to have so many qualms about this, yet you haven’t exactly run to turn me in. How’s that line go, in that book you’re always reading? ‘Methinks the lady doth protest too much’?”

Rey folded her arms across her chest, blushing furiously. He had just struck a nerve, and he knew it. After a few moments, she hissed at him in a dry whisper,

“I positively despise you, Matt.”

He nodded, still smirking at her, and whispered back,

“I know. But I’m working hard, to change that, mi’lady.”

He reached out to touch her arm, but she pulled back and stalked off to meet Finn.

“Nice talking to you, ma’am” he called after her, watching as she walked away.


	2. Chapter 2

The next week, the inevitable happened.

General Organa returned from her mission, and eventually went down to maintenance, to greet the new technicians that Poe had hired in her absence.

When she got to Kylo, she reached out to shake his hand, then looked up into his eyes and froze. Her face went rapidly from deathly white to plum purple, then back again, as if her body wouldn’t decide whether to faint, or to explode. Yet she quickly pushed it off, hiding this reaction from the others by saying that she had had a rough journey, and was tired.

Later that evening, after calming down, she had ‘Matt’ paged into her chambers, to ‘fix her conservator’.

He came in with his toolbox and waited, heart pounding, for the doors to slide shut behind them. He didn’t know what to expect. Part of him fully anticipate to be shot with a blaster, another part, launched out of the airlock.

Leia quietly went and sat on her sofa, motioning for him to join her. He sat down gingerly beside her, careful to keep a few feet between them.

Neither spoke for the longest time, and then Leia said, her voice trembling,

“Sometimes, when one gets older, one starts to truly question things. Physical things like eyesight isn’t what it used to be, or emotional things, like personal judgement. Sometimes an old lady might see something that isn’t really there, because she WANTS to see it, so badly.”

She looked Kylo in the eyes.

“Am I just a crazy old woman?”

Slowly, Kylo took off his glasses, then he removed his blonde wig, laying it carefully beside him.

“You’re neither old, nor crazy, mom.”

A pause, and then she slapped him across the face so hard that he very nearly went flying off the couch. He put his hand to his cheek, scared.

“Sorry, but I always said that if I ever saw you again, I needed to do two things; the first being to hit you for all I was worth.”

Kylo rubbed along his sore face, moving his mouth to get some feeling back into it.

“All things considered, I deserve much, much worse. What’s the second thing?”

She leaned forward and closed her arms around him tightly, squeezing the air out of his lungs. 

“I’m not sure which hurt more,” Kylo said as he pulled away.

“Baby. Why in the world are you here? Are you here to kill me, too?”

“No. I’m here for Rey. I want her, I want her to be my wife.”

He slowly began to explain the past few months to Leia, and the nature of his relationship to Rey. She shook her head and sighed when he was finished.

“For as much as you claim to not be like Han, you certainly inherited your father’s talent for getting into difficult situations.”

“Look, I know this is crazy, but, please, let me stay. I need to be near her; it’s painful when I’m not.”

“What about the First Order, Ben? Aren’t you the Supreme Leader now?”

“I’ve put Hux in temporary charge during my absence. But he doesn’t know I’m here; he thinks I’m on a retreat with my knights. And don’t worry, I went to great lengths to hide the location of this place, so he won’t find you.”

Leia shook her head. “No, baby, that’s not what I meant. What happens if you DO win over Rey? Because I don’t think she’d just give up this cause, to go back with you.”

Kylo hunched his shoulders and put his head in his hands. “I don’t know, mom. Really I have no answers. I just know that I can’t live without her, so I’m trying my best, here. Please let me stay?”

Leia sighed, then held out her arms for her son. He went into them and allowed her to cradle him, like she used to when he was a child.

“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” she said, as she stroked his hair.

— -

“What is that place?”

Kylo was standing and looking through a small window, in an area of the base he was visiting for the first time. Inside was something he never expected to see: children. Some playing with toys, some reading, some eating. They all seemed very young, although there were a few older ones scattered here and there.

"Many of our recruits happen to be single mothers; women whose husbands or boyfriends were taken by The First Order. While they train in various departments during the day, we provide daycare services for them." Poe, who had been walking with him along this hallway, explained this to him.

Kylo nodded thoughtfully, looking through the window. "Who attends to the children?"

"It's a varying office; we try to rotate everyone's schedules so that no one person is stuck here every day."

"Smart."

Poe nodded. "But in all seriousness, Rey volunteers more than the rest of us."

Kylo's head snapped up in attention. "Does she?"

"Yeah. She's great with kids. I think, well, I think sometimes she's more comfortable around the little ones, than anyone else."

~~~

A few days later, 'Matt' was dispatched to the the daycare, to repair a broken-legged chair in the employee kitchen. He went in the middle of the afternoon, and was pleasantly surprised that Rey was the one on-duty.

He nodded a greeting at her and hurried into the kitchen, to do what he was called for. As he worked, he kept the door open, so as to hear Rey's voice. Apparently it was nap-time for the little group of toddlers, and Rey was sitting on the floor in front of the mats, reading to them from a large story-book.

Kylo paused in his work, to listen to Rey's voice. It was soft, and soothing. The eyes of the children were fluttering, and several had already fallen asleep, their heads on the little pillows.

" . . . and the Princess found the castle by the sea, where she lived happily ever after."

By now, all of the kids were asleep, and she tiptoed around the little group, covering them with blankets. Kylo stood in the connecting doorway.

"That's not how the story ends," Kylo whispered when she came near.

She jumped a little; she hadn't even realized that he was still there.

"And how would you know?", she whispered back.

"My, uh, my mother would read that to me, when I was a boy. And the princess doesn't just go to the castle by the sea; she marries the prince, first."

Rey made a snorting sound in the back of her throat, and walked around to the front of the room, away from the kids, so that they could speak normally.

"Well, that's the re-written version. The one that makes sense," she said, straightening up the scatter of toys all over the floor.

Kylo watched her for a few moments, before saying "So what do you do, while they're off in dreamland?"

Rey straightened back up and shrugged. She headed towards the small kitchen, and he followed.

"Sometimes I nap, too. Other times I sit in here, read a bit, have a snack."

She sat down at the table, in the chair that he hadn't fixed, and opened up a book. It was clear from her body language that she wanted him to go, but he couldn't bring himself to walk away. This was the first extended interaction he had had with her where she wasn’t openly hostile, and he didn't want it to end. 

"Is it alright if I have some water?", he asked, opening the conservator door.

"Help yourself."

He took out the pitcher of water, and a glass from the cabinet. He poured some for himself and drank it down slowly, trying to think of something else to say to her.

"What are you reading?"

She looked up, clearly exasperated. 

" _Why_?"

"Curiosity."

Sighing, she held up the book so that the cover was facing him.

"Astromech Diagnostics Manual 2.0? That's -- interesting."

She shrugged. "They've come out with several new models of droid this year, and, if we get the funds, General Organa wants to obtain some for the base. I figure it won't hurt to brush up on a few things."

Now she looked sideways at Matt. "You know, it probably wouldn't kill YOU, to brush up on a few things, yourself."

"What do you mean?", he asked, frowning. "What am I 'brushing up' on?”

"Simple repairs, maybe. For example, that chair you were supposed to fix. Any idiot could see that you didn't balance out the legs properly. If someone sits in that, they're going to fall out to the floor."

"Will not."

"Will too," she replied, turning another page.

Scowling, he pulled out the chair in question and sat himself gingerly down on it.

"See? It's perfectly . . ."

The two back legs wobbled drunkenly, and suddenly Kylo found himself spilling to the ground.

Rey burst into laughter, completely unable to help herself. Kylo picked himself up, red-faced, but unable to help laughing a little, himself, at the sound of Rey's mirth.

Still chuckling, she came over to him, and took the tool out of his hand. "The problem is that when you adjusted the screw on this leg, you didn't compensate for the other," she said, doing the work herself.

Kylo watched her, feeling overwhelmed. Having her this close, again; feeling her warmth, inhaling her clean, sweet scent --he wanted to put his arms around her. Maker, he wanted to _kiss_ her.

"Are you quite alright?", she asked, moving backwards a step and staring at him warily.

He quickly pulled himself together. "I'm fine."

"Are you sure? You look -- funny. Kind of like you're going to faint, or something."

"I'm fine," he repeated, blushing.

"Do you want to lay down? I'm sure I can find a spot for you with the other kids, _Matt_ ," she said, half-teasing him.

He smiled and shook his head. "I'll be alright. Provided no more treacherous chairs try and attack me, that is."

This time they both laughed, and Kylo marveled to himself at how good that sounded, the two of laughing, _together_.

They must have been just a little too loud, though, because small shuffling noise were heard in the next room, shortly accompanied by a soft-voice "Miss Rey?"

Rey sighed a little to herself. "I better go back out there. Once one wakes up, it's not long before the rest do, too."

Kylo nodded, watching as she headed for the door. A thought was shouting itself loudly in his head, and before she passed into the other room, he gathered his courage and said,

"Rey?"

She turned back around. "Yes?"

"I was thinking of maybe going off-base tonight. Explore the area a little bit. Would -- would you like to come with me? If you're not busy?"

Rey smiled, and an eagerness came over her face that Kylo hadn't yet seen. His heart soared, thinking that she was going to accept his invitation. But then, something changed, like a cloud passing over a sunny sky. She bit her lower lip and folded her arms across her chest.

"No."

He nodded, trying to keep the disappointment from his face by forcing a smile.

"Okay. Some other time."

He gathered up his tools and walked to the opposite door.

"See you around," he called over his shoulder.

He was beyond disappointed. Every time he thought that he was making some kind of progress with her, she shut him down. He didn’t know whether he had the energy to keep on being rejected, to keep on getting hurt by her. He refused to believe for a second that she didn’t love him, back. She was just too scared to SHOW it, that was all.


	3. Chapter 3

“So what’s the deal with you guys, anyway?”

“W-what do you mean?”

Finn stopped polishing and set down his rag. 

He and Rey had volunteered to polish up the x-wings after the pilots had them out during drills. It was tedious work, but a good chance for them to get away from the loud bustle of the rest of the base, to talk.

Kylo Ren’s disguise worked quite well, and he had managed to become friends with a great deal of people in the Resistance. Finn was one of his new friends, and, unsurprisingly, ‘Matt’ apparently spoke to Finn quite a bit, about Rey. Earlier that day, Finn and a group of several others made plans to go to the cantina, after work. Matt was in that group, and once Rey heard he was going, she politely declined. Finn was trying to change her mind on that, now.

Using the back of his wrist to wipe a bead of sweat from his forehead, he elaborated:

“I don’t know, it’s just, there’s a really odd energy between you two. From your end, it’s like hate, but not really hate. Hard to explain.”

Rey looked down at her feet, her hands nervously fiddling with her rag.

“It’s not his fault, you know,” Finn told her, speaking softly. “He can’t help the way he looks.”

Rey looked up at Finn sharply. “What do you mean by that?”

“Are we just going to pretend to ignore the fact that he looks very, very similar to Kylo Ren?”

Rey felt herself blush, and she quickly moved around to the other side of the ship she was working on. “Does he? I hadn’t noticed.”

Finn followed her. “It’s okay, you know, to be angry. I know Kylo hurt you a lot, and it’s understandable that any reminder of him, even subtle ones, likely put you off. But Rey, I think you should try and give Matt a fair chance.”

“Finn - -“

“It’s clear that he really likes you, Rey. I know you already said no, but I wish you’d reconsider going out with us tonight. You’d make him so happy, and who knows, you might just have fun.”

_Finn, if you had even the slightest idea of who Matt REALLY was, you’d swallow those words._

“Why do you care so much, about Matt?”

Finn shrugged. “I sympathize, I guess. The man came from the same hell that I did. I know how hard it is to find happiness when it, along with everything else, has been systematically crushed out of you.”

_Yes ... crushed out by ‘Matt’ HIMSELF._

Instead of saying this, she just sighed a little. “Maybe, okay? Maybe, but no promises.”

Finn smiled and hugged her, then they got back to work on their polishing.

— -

Cantinas were always so loud, and smoke-filled. On Jakku, during the leaner month when the pickings were scarce for scavenging, Rey had worked for a while in a dusky little cantina. No where near as large as this one, though. She remembered having constant headaches from the loud music, and a sore bottom from all the males that would pinch it, as she walked around serving drinks.

She wasn’t even sure why she had come, now. After assuring Finn that he could go and play pool, that she’d be fine on her own, she took a seat at the bar and asked for a glass of water.

She was only there a few moments, sipping her drink and watching those around her, before he strolled up, a huge smile on his face.

Kylo took the stool next to her, his long legs dangling over the side.

“Huh. Fancy seeing YOU here.”

When Rey didn’t respond, he asked, hopefully, “Can I buy you a drink?”

She turned her head to glare at him, and said, in a cold voice,

“I’m afraid it would take all the alcohol in this galaxy, to make me want you sitting next to me, Matt.”

Undeterred, Kylo went on: “Well, how about some food, then? I don’t know about you, but the smells in the air are making my mouth water.”

She was about to deny him again, when her stomach, of its own accord, gave an embarrassingly loud rumble. Loud enough for both of them to hear it.

Kyko chuckled and, after signaling the barkeep, ordered a head-turning amount of ‘snacks’ for them to share. He also ordered her a drink with the least possible amount of liquor, something he said was like juice “with a kick”.

Rey raised an eyebrow. “All that food costs quite a bit. You don’t think it’ll raise suspicions, that you can afford all of that on the meager Resistance pay?”

Kylo smiled and took a sip of his drink.

“No, not really. I’ve already let it ‘slip’ to a few people that I stole a good chunk of my commanding officer’s credits, as a going-away present, when I ‘left’ the Order. So if I want to spend some feeding a pretty girl, that’s my own business, isn’t it?”

Rey sighed, looking down into her own drink. She ran her finger along the circular edge, tracing little looping scrawls, and said, quietly, “You just figure out everything, don’t you?”

“Not at all. I still haven’t figured out YOU, dear. Not yet.”

“What if you never do? Does all of this end?”, she asked him, whispering. “Do you shed Matt, disappear, go back to being Kylo Ren? Back to the First Order?”

Kylo sighed and bit his lips. “I don’t know, Rey. Clearly, this entire thing is the most desperate, ridiculous act I’ve ever committed myself to in my entire life. But I can’t give up on you, or that there could be an ‘us’. It’s a very difficult thing, to acknowledge both that you love somebody, and that your ‘somebody’ doesn’t feel the same. And possibly never will. But please, don’t ask me to give up trying, not yet. Okay?”

Rey was actually quite touched by Kylo’s little speech, although she tried hard not to show it. Luckily, she didn’t have to say anything just then, as the food had come out. There was so much that they opted to sit at one of the little tables scattered along the wall, so as not to take up the entire bar.

They sat quietly and ate for awhile, or rather, Rey ate, and Kylo nibbled at bits and pieces. After it seemed the edge had been taken off her appetite, and she was calmer, Kylo said,

“You know I haven’t set foot in a cantina in almost ten years?”

“Why’s that?”

“Well, I used to be made to go with, er, with Han Solo, when I was a kid. He always used to meet his clients in them.”

“Why not a nicer place?”

Kylo half-shrugged, half-laughed. “My mother wasn’t very tolerant of the sort of people he’d associate with, so they weren’t welcome in our home. And Han was entirely too rough around the edges for nicer venues. So, cantinas it was.”

He paused and took down the rest of his drink, then signaled to order another.

He watched the way the bubbles crawled up the glass of his new drink, before continuing with his explanation.

“Anyway, Han insisted that it was strategy.”

“Strategy? How?”

“He said you can always tell a lot about a man, by the way he acts when he’s drunk. Any client that couldn’t handle himself intoxicated, wasn’t one he trusted to do business with. ‘Strategy’.”

Here he paused again, letting out a barking laugh.

“Of course, Han wasn’t the easiest to handle, himself, when he’d had too much to drink.”

He rolled up one of his sleeves and leaned closer to her, pointing at a thin, jagged scar that ran from his elbow to about halfway down his inner arm.

“Do you know how I got this?”

She shook her head.

“One time Han got into a drinking contest with a potential client. Huge fellow, a Gomorrean. They were drinking Corelian whiskey, which, I don’t know if you know anything about that, but it’s STRONG. Half a cup is enough to put a Wookiee on his behind. But do you know how many cups Han took down?”

“Two? Or three?”

“Twenty-six.”

“Holy kriff!”, Rey exclaimed, feeling shocked and horrified.

“I know. We all couldn’t figure out how he managed to stand on his feet, let alone LIVE, after that. But he did. He walked up to the Gomorrean and demanded he make good on his deal to sell Han a bunch of really expensive parts for his ship, at about 1/10 of the cost.”

“So everything worked out?”

“Of course not. They rarely did, with Han. Turns out he had paid the barkeep to water down his portion of the drinks, so that they weren’t as potent as his competitors. Chewbacca got into a fight with the man, and he, angry, told the Gomorrean how Han had cheated him.”

“Uh-oh.”

“Exactly. We had to get out of there, and fast. But by now Han has had several real drinks on top of the watered whiskey, so he’s actually drunk. I grabbed his legs and Chewie grabbed his arms, and we took off running for the Falcon. We get to the loading ramp and, confused, Han starts struggling. I drop him and fall. Chewie picks him up and throws him into the Falcon. Then he does the same with me, telling me to tuck my head. I tucked my head but my arm scraped pretty hard along the metal floor. Hence the scar. And hence one of the many, many reasons I avoid places like this.”

He looked at her expectantly, thinking that she would laugh. But she didn’t. Rey sat still, slowly nibbling a bit of food, and tilting her mostly empty glass in-between both hands. She looked - - upset?

“I wish I had stories like that. Things that I could say I did, with my father. Bad things, good things, just ... ANYTHING.”

Kylo felt his heart clench in his chest. He hadn’t meant to make her sad at all, and the quiet way she was speaking was tearing him up. He took a deep breath, and said,

“Focusing on the past can be painful. Why not focus on the present? You have a family now, Rey; so many people who love and care about you.”

“I know. It’s just ....”

She stopped, staring Kylo full in the face for the first time. So many things she could tell him, so many things she was positive that he, alone, would understand.

But IT was still there.

The whirring hiss of a lightsaber cutting into human flesh, Finn’s flesh, as the latter tried to save her from death.

The defeated eyes of the bombers coming back missing more than half their number, after defending themselves against a vicious First Order attack.

KYLO’S eyes, livid and half-insane, as he screamed at her about her inability to let go.

All of that was still there, in him, and no matter how hard she tried to see past it, it never fully went away.

She dropped his gaze and quickly stood up.

“Thank you for the food, Matt,” she said, her voice somewhat cold and detached. “But I think I’m going to go back to base now. I’m a bit tired.”

He stood up as well.

“Let me see you back, then.”

He put his hand on her shoulder, but she shook it off.

“I’ll be fine, really. Goodnight.”

He sighed and sat back down. Nodding, he said, quietly, “Alright. Goodnight, Rey.”

He waited until she’d left the room, then he quickly sprinted to the door. He had to see with his own eyes that she was safe. He watched from the little window and was relieved when a nice-looking woman in a speeder cab pulled up, and Rey got in.

When she was gone, Kylo walked back to their table, feeling dejected. He felt that the closer he tried to get to Rey, the harder she pushed him away. He started to wonder whether this entire thing was worth it, at all.

A hand clapping on his shoulder interrupted his thoughts, and he looked up into the face of Poe Dameron.

“Hey, man,” Poe said, taking the seat across from him. He helped himself to some of the leftover food before saying, quietly,

“She’s a tough one to crack, huh?”

“Rey?”

“Yes, Rey.”

Poe leaned back in the chair, cocking a boot up on the table.

“Starting to think I should just give up,” Kylo told him, half-joking, half wanting to see what his response would be.

“Give up?”, Poe repeated, a look of sheer disgust sliding over his face. “What the hells, man? NEVER give up!”

“But it’s clear she doesn’t like me.”

Poe sat up straight and shook his head. He ordered them both a beer before saying, earnestly,

“Rey . . . I don’t know how much you know about her, Matt, but she’s had a hard life. Being abandoned by her parents, the trauma of discovering that she can use the Force, falling for Kylo Ren, and all the bad ...”

“Wait, wait; what do you mean, ‘falling’ for Kylo Ren?”

Poe cursed and then clapped a hand to his mouth, looking annoyed with himself. A woman brought over their beers, and he took a long swallow of his before speaking again.

“I really shouldn’t say this, but, maybe it’s best you know, so that you understand what you’re working against. She, well, she ended up really falling for that man, during the time they spent together.”

“H-how do you know that?”

“Rey made the mistake of confusing that very truth to Rose, one of the biggest gossips in the Resistance. Sweet girl but can’t keep her mouth closed. But anyway, that’s what I’ve heard.”

Kylo took a large drink of his own beer, before Poe could see the huge, out of place smile that wanted to dawn on his face. When he felt composed again, he said, casually,

“A woman like Rey in love with a monster like Kylo Ren? Disgusting.”

And again, Poe surprised him. Instead of agreeing with that statement, he was vigorously shaking his head.

“As much as I want to say that you’re right, I can’t. Because I know Rey. She has the biggest heart of anyone I’ve ever met before. If she loves, or loved, someone like Kylo Ren, I have no choice but to believe Kylo is somehow worthy of that love. It’s just, things didn’t work. But they could work with YOU, and her. I know it. So DON’T GIVE UP, nerfherder.”

Kylo allowed the smile to appear now, pairing it with a lighthearted laugh. Poe didn’t know it, but he had just renewed Kylo’s commitment to fight.

Kylo stood and stretched his legs. “I think maybe I’ll go back to base now, I’m a little ..”

Poe jumped up in front of him. “Not so fast, Matt. No trip to the cantina is complete without at least ONE game of sabacc,” he declared, pulling a scratched-up deck of cards from his pocket. He whistled for Finn and a few others, who made their way across the crowded floor towards them. “Unless you’re scared we’ll clean you out?”

Kylo just smiled and settled himself back into his chair.

I guarantee I’ll have at least 20 credits from every man at this table, or I’m not Han Solo’s son, he thought to himself. Never gamble with the son of a gambler, boys.

He wasn’t wrong.


	4. Chapter 4

The full moon shone brightly on the water, and the air was unusually warm, almost sultry, for the time of year.

Kylo was outside, walking. It was early evening, and he had just finished with his work for the day. One of the things he loved about being here, was that this base was surrounded by a large, glimmering lake. When he had free time, he liked to take off his boots, roll up his pants, and wade into the warm water, thinking up new ways to get Rey to talk to him.

Ever since their night at the bar, she hadn’t really spoken to him at all, outside of a polite greeting when in the presence of other people. It was frustrating, to be so close to what you want more than anything, and being unable to reach out and grab it. To hold it.

To kiss it.

He rounded a little sandy path, his mind on his dilemma “, when he came across a lone figure sitting at the edge of the water, knees drawn up to the chest, staring at the sky.

Oh, no.

She was going to think he had come out here on purpose, to follow her. He quickly turned around, hoping to get away before she could see him, when her voice, low and soft, called out “Ben.”

He sheepishly turned around and made his way towards her, sitting gingerly next to her on the ground.

“Just so you know ...”

“You didn’t know I was out here. I know.”

They sat quietly for a few moments, each lost in their own thoughts. Then Rey turned towards him and said, softly,

“Is it odd to love something that you’re also afraid of?”

Kylo’s heart leapt in his chest, thinking that she was surely talking about him. That excitement quickly died, though, when she continued:

“I love the water. This lake is absolutely beautiful. But I’m also scared of it.”

“Why would you be scared?”

She laughed a little. “I suppose it’s because I never learned how to swim. I always figured that if I went any farther than ankle-deep, I’d probably drown.”

He stood up and pulled off his shirt, then readjusted the pulled-up legs of his pants.

“Come on, I’ll teach you.” He held out his hand to her.

She held back, hesitant. “T-that’s Okay, Ben.”

“Please? It’ll be fun. If you don’t like it, we’ll stop. Okay?”

She eyed his hand a moment longer, then cautiously reached out to take it, allowing herself to be pulled to her feet.

"I don't know about this, Ben," she said doubtfully, eyeing the calm lake. "I'm scared."

"You don't have anything to be scared of. I'm here. I won't let anything happen to you, I promise."

She nodded, taking a deep breath. He led her slowly into deeper water, holding her hand gently.

"Okay, now, I'm going to lift you up by your stomach. Practice kicking your feet and paddling. When you kick, try and keep your feet under the water. When you paddle, think of it as pulling yourself up a wall, but horizontally."

Rey grimaced. "You won't let me drown?"

"Of course not."

He gently elevated her sideways, his hands firmly underneath her belly. She practiced the movements he had dictated to her, cautiously.

"This isn't so bad," she said after a while.

"Good. Keep that in mind, because now, I'm going to let go, and let you swim out a bit from me."

"What? No! Let me down!", she exclaimed in a panic, struggling in his arms. He held her in place.

"We'll start off slow, then. I'll hold onto just your hands, while you kick. Then we'll go from there."

Little by little, with Kylo holding her and encouraging her, Rey got more comfortable in the water. There were a few terrifying times when she slipped completely beneath the waves, but she fought her way right back up again. By the end of their session, she could swim confidently from halfway in the lake, to shore.

"Thank you, Ben!", she exclaimed, and before she could stop herself, she was hugging him.

"It's no problem," he said, blushing. "You're a good student." Then he looked carefully at both of them. "We're gonna have a hard time explaining to the others why we're soaking wet in the middle of the night, though."

Rey plopped herself down on the sand. “It's so warm; let's just lay here awhile and let the air dry us."

She lay on her back, and after a moments hesitation, Kylo laid with her.

The sky above them was crammed with millions of stars, every shape, size and color imaginable. It scared Kylo, a little, and he unconsciously scooted closer to Rey.

"Are there supposed to be that many?", he asked in a hushed tone, awed.

"The stars?"

"Yes."

"Yes, Ben. Of course, how many you actually SEE depends on the amount of artificial light surrounding the area. The darker, the better. It's dark here, so we get to see a lot."

"The First Order is too damn bright," Matt muttered, mostly to himself. "I don't think I even knew the stars existed, like this."

"I used to lay outside of my hut on Jakku, and look at the stars," Rey said quietly. "I'd try to imagine what it would be like, seeing one star get bigger and bigger, coming towards me, and right when it looked like it was going to crash, I'd realize that it was a ship. I'd watch it land, and when the door opened, it'd be my mother and father, coming back for me."

She stopped talking for a long while, and Kylo could sense, without looking, that she was crying. He timidly reached over and took her hand in his, squeezing it. She squeezed back.

"It's why I dressed the way I did for so long. Same hair style, same kind of clothing. I always worried that when they came back, if I had changed, they wouldn't recognize me."

Here she pressed Kylo's hand tighter, giving a long, shuddering sigh.

"Dreams die quickly, though, in the face of reality. I stopped doing that once I learned the truth: they aren't coming back. They never intended to. They sold me, and left."

“I’m so sorry, that I told you that. I don’t know if I ever apologized for it before, but I am sorry. The way I told you was cruel and insensitive, and you didn’t deserve that.”

Rey shrugged. "Insensitive or not, I'm actually thankful that you told me. Now I can stop waiting, I can stop watching. I can stop dreaming."

"No!" Kylo exclaimed, sitting up. Rey sat up with him, looking at him in confusion. "Never stop dreaming altogether; just change the dream. You have too much goodness in you, to let the actions of two stupid people define your future. One day you’ll have everything you could ever want, and you’ll be happy. I know it.”

Rey leaned over and hugged him, her tiny arms wrapping softly around his shoulders. "Thank you, Ben," she whispered in his ear. I needed to hear that, too."

As she started to pull away, Kylo acted on impulse, and kissed her cheek. Her eyes widened, and he winced, thinking that she was surely going to yell at him, or hit him, something.

Instead, she just smiled.  
And stood up.

“I think we’re more than dry enough, now, aren’t we?” she asked him, beginning to walk away from him.

But no.  
No, no, no no no, NO.

Kylo could not live through her walking away from him any more.

He jumped up and ran after her. He gently took hold of her arm, turned her around, and kissed her. REALLY kissed her. When he was done, he let go and stepped back, his heart pounding, to see what she would do. It had to be her decision, to either end or continue this. It had to be –

It continued.

It continued, standing by the water, their arms around each other.  
It continued, as she took his hand and led him quickly, quietly back to her quarters.  
It continued until he woke up the next morning, curled up next to Rey in her small bunk.

He was having a hard time deciding whether she looked more beautiful asleep, or awake. He ran his fingers gently up and down her arms, just light enough so as not to wake her up. Her hair was a coiled mahogany sheaf spread over her arms and shoulders; he gently pulled it back, so that he could kiss her neck.

As the early-morning sun rose slowly farther up the sky, he sighed to himself, thinking.

He had a decision to make. One that would effect both his and Rey’s lives, forever.

She wouldn’t come back to The First Order with him, any more than he could continue to pretend to be Matt, and stay here with her. But he couldn’t fathom going back, without her.

A decision. And Kylo Ren, Ben Solo and Matt were all terrible at decision-making.


	5. Chapter 5

Days had passed, and Rey was genuinely surprised that her body was capable of producing more tears. She felt sure she must have given them all up by now, but no, more came hot and surging to her eyes, whether she called them forth or not.

The morning after she slept with Kylo, she had woken up, and he was gone. She thought maybe he had gone to use the refresher, so she waited. He wasn’t there.

Then she thought, maybe there was an emergency in maintenance that he had to leave and take care of. But no, he wasn’t there, either. And he never showed up.

Before anyone else around the base realized he was missing, Rey scoured it completely, searching for him. 

But the man was nowhere to be found. It was as though he had dropped off of the face of existence.

Theories abounded for days, afterwards, about what had happened to the charismatic technician. But Rey avoided any and all talk of him, when she could help it. It was simply too painful. She and Leia made the agreement to never tell anybody about Matt’s real identity, and even as Leia spoke the words, Rey’s heart broke for the older woman. As hard as this was on Rey, she knew it was twice as hard on Leia. 

And both were secretly concerned: Kylo Ren knew so much about them, now, and the base. Both lived in constant fear that an attack was imminent, and Leia showed this fear by having Poe put the troops through more rigorous testing and training than ever before.

“It’s over,” Rey told herself, more than once. “It’s over, and that’s okay. He didn’t love me, he just wanted to get into my bed one more time before taking off. But that’s okay, it happened, it’s over, and now I can move on.”

Yet there were a great many nights that she cried herself to sleep, over the loss of her friend.

One week turned into two, then three, then a whole month had gone by without Rey hearing any news. One day, after her shift in the daycare, she was summoned to Leia’s office. 

Upon entering, she knew right away that something was wrong. Leia’s face was flushed with excitement, and she was pacing back and forth across the floor, talking to herself, a piece of paper clutched in her hands.

“Leia? What’s wrong?!”

Leia turned towards her, tears in her eyes. Unable to speak, she held the piece of paper out to Rey

Rey took it with shaking hands, and, like Leia, her jaw dropped.

“Is ... is this _real_?”

Leia could only shrug.

The paper in Rey’s hand was a formal document, calling for a truce between the First Order and the Resistance. It was an incredibly detailed proposal for Kylo Ren to terminate his own rule as Supreme Leader, and an invitation for Leia to join him in establishing a new, democratic government in place of the Order’s regime.

Rey couldn’t believe it.

Her awe deepened, when Leia handed her a second letter, this one tied with a lovely pink bow.

“It’s addressed just to you, honey.”

Rey carefully untied the bow, and several crushed rose petals fell out of the paper. Also clattering to the floor was a gorgeous gold ring, with three large pink stones set in the middle. Rey picked it up examined it closely, before reading to herself,

 _Rey_ ,

_I realize that you’re probably furious with me, and you have every right to be. But I couldn’t tell you where I was going, or what I intended to do. I knew it would be dangerous, and I knew you would have wanted to come with me, which I couldn’t allow to happen. Convincing my own cabinet to pursue this path of peace is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to attempt, and it got rather bloody. I was forced to take the lives of General Hux, and several others, who only wanted to bring death to you. I’m ready to change, I’m ready to be a positive force in this universe. I knew you would never want me unless I showed you I was serious about changing, which, I hope this letter, and the one to my mother, proves that I am. There’s a long, difficult road ahead, to take things to a better place. But I’m willing to work hard and do whatever is necessary, to atone for my mistakes, and the brutality of the Order. But I can’t do anything without you, my other half, my soul. Please, forgive me, and please, honor me with your hand. I’m sure you’ve found the ring by now. One week from the date of this letter, I wish to meet with you, my mother, and her men, to discuss this. If you accept my love, I hope I will see you wearing the ring. I eagerly await seeing your face._

_I love you,_   
_Ben_

“What do we do?”

Leia day down at her desk, thinking over Rey’s question. Finally, a nervous smile on her face, she said,

“I’m going.”

“You are?”

“Yes. This is what I’ve been working towards for over a decade: bringing peace to our galaxy. I’m going to call a meeting first thing tomorrow and inform everyone else.”

Now she stood up and went to the girl, taking Rey’s hands gently between her own.

“But that doesn’t mean YOU have to come, honey. You have a decision to make, one that will impact your life forever. I love my son but he is an idiot. He hurt you. But he seems willing to make up for it. But it’s not my decision, or his, or anyone else’s: it’s YOURS. We have a week until we go; I want you to think long and hard, about what you want to do. Okay?”

Rey nodded, and Leia kissed her cheek.

“And no matter what you decide, sweetheart; I already consider you to be my daughter, and I love you, so much.”

Rey hugged her fiercely, tears rolling down her face, before leaving to go back to her own quarters.

She had a decision to make.


	6. Chapter 6

Leia looked nervously out the window of her ship, as it made its descent unto the landing pad. She had to admit that she was impressed; the First Order housed many impressive-looking buildings that dwarfed the Resistance facilities by comparison. Her heart was pounding as her son came into view, standing with his arms behind his back as he watched the ship land. She wanted so badly to believe that Ben had been sincere in his claims that he wanted to change; but she would not have gotten this far in life, if she didn’t retain a healthy air of caution about all things.

And she knew she wasn’t alone; those she had brought with her were also afraid, and Leia could feel that fear as needles sticking her sides.

She was the first to disembark, and she walked down the ramp slowly towards her son. Not knowing what to expect, not knowing whether she was about to walk into her own ambush and execution.

When she was still a few feet away, he startled her by rushing towards her. She braced herself, and she could feel those behind her tensing up, ready to counter-attack.

Instead, he lifted the diminutive woman into his arms, and squeezed for all he was worth.

“I love you, mom. I’m so happy you came.”

“I’m happy you invited me, baby.”

She patted his face as he let her down, and more of her own people came slowly down the ramp. He instructed his advisors to lead them to his dining hall, where he had prepared a feast, to welcome them.

Leia and the others left, and Kylo remained, watching anxiously as the last of the ship was drained of people.

His heart stopped.  
She was there!

He watched her approach, so many emotions running through him that he could hardly remain upright.

“Hello, Ben.”

“Hello, Rey.”

Unable to help himself, he looked down at her small hands, and her fingers.

Her empty fingers.

“You’re ... the ring isn’t on your finger.”

Rey shook her head. “No. It’s not.”

Kylo took a deep, shuddering breath, and timidly took hold of her hands.

“I told myself I was going to be mature, and accept whatever decision you made. Can ... are we friends, then?”

Rey shook her head again. “No.”

Kylo’s yes filled with disbelief. “N-no?”

Pulling her hands out of his, Rey reached into the front of her dress, and pulled out a long silver necklace.

His ring was on the end of it.

“You grossly miscalculated the size of my finger, Ben. This ring is way too big. We’re going to have to get it resized, before I can wear it.”

“Do you mean ...”

She jumped into his arms, her legs wrapping around his waist, her arms circling his shoulders.

“I mean that I love you, Ben Solo, and I want to be your partner in every single thing you do, from now on.”

Kylo smiled, and kissed her passionately. “You DO realize, this means I can’t let you go, ever again?”

“Good. It makes me feel less weird to say that I have all my things packed on the ship, and I fully intend to move in with you.”

“Really?! Holy Vader, I can’t believe it! I have so many ideas for decorating, and I’ve got to ...”

Rey kissed him again, stopping his words. “First, we have a dinner to attend. Then, we need to start the process of rebuilding the galaxy.”

Kylo nodded. “Of course. Right away.”

“Er, you ARE going to let me down?”

Kylo just adjusted her more snugly in his arms, and began to walk with her inside.

“Nope.”

— -

5 years later:

“Mama?”, the little girl asked, pulling at Rey’s skirt. “How did you and papa meet?”

Ben smiled and picked up his daughter, kissing her cheek. 

“It’s a long, looooong story, Hanah,” he told her, laying her down in her bed. As Rey tucked her in, she asked,

“I still want to hear it. Please?”

Rey and Ben looked at each other, and smiled. Both sat on either side of their daughter’s bed, and Ben, smiling, began:

“A long time ago, in ....”


End file.
